Carl Safina is one of six conservation heroes in the running for the quarter million-dollar Indianapolis Prize

INDIANAPOLIS – Officials from the Indianapolis Prize today named the Safina Center’s Carl Safina as one of six Finalists for the world’s leading award for animal conservation. Carl Safina joins conservation heroes Dr. Joel Berger, Dr. P. Dee Boersma, Dr. Sylvia Earle, Dr. Rodney Jackson and Dr. Russell Mittermeier in the running for the prestigious title of Indianapolis Prize Winner and an unrestricted $250,000 prize.

The Indianapolis Prize was created in 2006 to recognize best-in-class conservation solutions, bring innovative ideas to scale and reward the conservation heroes who have achieved major victories in saving species from extinction. Carl has been honored as a 2018 Indianapolis Prize Finalist for his work to inspire conservation of the natural world through science, art and literature; his establishment of a sustainable seafood program; and his work banning high-seas drift nets and reforming federal fisheries laws. Carl has been named finalist for the Indianapolis Prize in 2010, 2014 and 2016.

“The Indianapolis Prize Finalists are consistent winners in the ongoing battles to save threatened species,” said Michael I. Crowther, chief executive officer of the Indianapolis Zoological Society, Inc., which administers the Indianapolis Prize as one of its signature global conservation initiatives. “By telling the stories of their heroism and their victories, the Indianapolis Prize aims to inspire more people to work for a planet that future generations will be happy to inherit, rather than be forced to endure.”

Carl is honored to again be named a finalist for this prestigious conservation prize.

The 2018 Indianapolis Prize Finalists include:

Joel Berger, Ph.D. (Colorado State University; Wildlife Conservation Society) — Distinguished scientist leading projects examining the effects of climate change on musk ox in the Alaskan Arctic, the impacts of energy development on wildlife in Greater Yellowstone, the threat of large carnivores on the conservation of endangered species such as Andean deer (huemul), the development of pronghorn antelope migration corridors, and saiga antelope conservation in Mongolia. Finalist for the 2014 and 2016 Indianapolis Prize.

P. Dee Boersma, Ph.D. (University of Washington; Center for Ecosystem Sentinels) — Conservationist dedicated to the study of global warming’s impact on penguins; successful in stopping both harvesting and the development of oil tanker lanes through penguin colonies.

Rodney Jackson, Ph.D. (Snow Leopard Conservancy) — Conducted in-depth radio-tracking studies of snow leopards since the 1980s; helped lead an international team in the first-ever range-wide genetic assessment of snow leopards, and as their classification has improved from endangered to vulnerable, he continues to create solutions to sustain their populations. Finalist for the 2008, 2010, 2012 and 2016 Indianapolis Prize.

Russell Mittermeier, Ph.D. (Global Wildlife Conservation) — Visionary leader able to motivate every level of conservation to support the greater good of many species, including saki and muriqui monkeys and other neotropical primates; one of the first academic primatologists to become concerned with the welfare and conservation of primates. Finalist for the 2012 and 2014 Indianapolis Prize.

Carl Safina, Ph.D. (The Safina Center) — Brought ocean conservation into the environmental mainstream by using science, art and literature to inspire a “sea ethic.” Established a sustainable seafood program, connecting science-based criteria with consumers; led efforts to ban high-seas drift nets and reform federal fisheries laws. Finalist for the 2010, 2014 and 2016 Indianapolis Prize.

At a time in which animals are going extinct at a rate not seen since the era of dinosaurs, a 2018 Atomik Research survey* finds that 9 in 10 Americans believe the government (federal and state) should do more to promote policies that protect endangered animals, and when give the definition of an animal conservationist, 83 percent of Americans say animal conservationists qualify as heroes.

“[The Indianapolis Prize] brings the most incredible people together to talk about their work and give us a message about where to go from here,” said Sigourney Weaver, actor and 2016 Jane Alexander Global Wildlife Ambassador, a title administered by the Indianapolis Prize to honor public figures who have been effective voices for wildlife conservation.

The 2018 Indianapolis Prize Jury, comprised of distinguished scientists and conservation leaders, will determine the Winner of the 2018 Indianapolis Prize, its $250,000 cash award and the Lilly Medal, an original work of art that signifies the Winner’s contributions to saving some of the world’s most threatened animals. Each of the five Finalists will receive $10,000.

The 2018 Indianapolis Prize Winner will be announced in late spring and formally honored at the Indianapolis Prize Gala presented by Cummins Inc. on Sept. 29, 2018 in Indianapolis.

“Winning the Indianapolis Prize gave my organizations a much bigger platform from which we could reach people with our conservation message,” said 2016 Prize Winner Dr. Carl Jones, chief scientist of the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust and scientific director the Mauritian Wildlife Foundation. “The field of animal conservation is fortunate to have an award that recognizes and celebrates individuals who have dedicated their life’s work to understanding biodiversity and protecting the species on which entire ecosystems depend.”

The Indianapolis Prize was first awarded in 2006 to Dr. George Archibald, the co-founder of the International Crane Foundation. The 2008 Winner was George Schaller, Ph.D., known as one of the founding fathers of wildlife conservation, and both a senior conservationist for the Wildlife Conservation Society and vice president for Panthera. In 2010, Iain Douglas Hamilton, Ph.D., founder of Save the Elephants, received the Prize for his pioneering research in elephant social behavior and for leading the way in the fight against the poaching of African elephants. Steven Amstrup, Ph.D., chief scientist for Polar Bears International, received the 2012 Prize for his work promoting the cause of the world’s largest land carnivore. In 2014, Dr. Patricia C. Wright, founder of Centre ValBio, became the first woman awarded the Indianapolis Prize for her dedication to saving Madagascar’s famed lemurs from extinction. Last year, Dr. Carl Jones received the 2016 Indianapolis Prize for his species recovery success on the island of Mauritius, including the echo parakeet, pink pigeon and Mauritius kestrel.

ABOUT THE INDIANAPOLIS PRIZE

The Indianapolis Prize recognizes and rewards conservationists who have achieved major victories in advancing the sustainability of an animal species or group of species. Winners receive the Lilly Medal and an unrestricted $250,000 award. Remaining Finalists each receive $10,000. The Indianapolis Prize has received support from the Eli Lilly and Company Foundation since its inception.

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2018/02/06/congratulations-carl-safina-2018-indianapolis-prize-finalist/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2018/02/06/congratulations-carl-safina-2018-indianapolis-prize-finalist/The Power Foresthttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/Im_nG5uG3DA/
http://carlsafina.org/2018/01/19/the-power-forest/#respondFri, 19 Jan 2018 14:40:05 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5532 In the course of writing a book about what free-living animals learn from each other, I find myself on the Tambopata River in southeast Peru. The nearest town is Puerto Maldonado but from there the trip is all upriver. Wheeled vehicles are useless in this forest, and there are none. The surrounding forest has […]

In the course of writing a book about what free-living animals learn from each other, I find myself on the Tambopata River in southeast Peru. The nearest town is Puerto Maldonado but from there the trip is all upriver. Wheeled vehicles are useless in this forest, and there are none. The surrounding forest has been officially protected with designations of national reserve and national park. Perhaps the strangest thing is that while it takes very special skills for humans to exist in the Amazon rainforest, my trip into the forest is amazingly comfortable. I’m here to hang out with scientists of the Tambopata Macaw Project at the Tambopata Research Center, a special privilege. My logistics are all being facilitated by the expert eco-tourism company Rainforest Expeditions, which is why my trip upriver is so easy.

Our first night, we stop at a tourist lodge called Refugio Amazonas. The next day we visit a Harpy Eagle nest with a big chick. I get lucky enough to see mama, too, when she delivers a monkey to her babe.

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2018/01/19/the-power-forest/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2018/01/19/the-power-forest/Tilikum. A Killer Whale’s Tragic Lifehttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/yJjgXzQocQQ/
http://carlsafina.org/2018/01/19/tilikum-killer-whales-tragic-life/#respondFri, 19 Jan 2018 14:32:54 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5529Tilikum has died. Involved in the killing of three humans, the focus of the movie Blackfish, and the book A Death at SeaWorld, Tilikum was certainly the most famous whale, and quite possibly the most noted and notorious non-human being, in the world.He was above all a performer. But beneath all, he was a killer whale. It’s a […]

]]>Wild orcas as they are supposed to live; in Washington State. Photo: Carl Safina

Tilikum has died.

Involved in the killing of three humans, the focus of the movie Blackfish, and the book A Death at SeaWorld, Tilikum was certainly the most famous whale, and quite possibly the most noted and notorious non-human being, in the world.He was above all a performer. But beneath all, he was a killer whale. It’s a name I use without prejudice. As Herman Melville wrote of the species in Moby-Dick, “Exception might be taken to the name bestowed upon this whale . . . for we are all killers.” And as a killer whale, he had a mind, a mind that could perhaps have been affected by a life of abuse.

In 1983 a two-year-old, 12-foot-long killer whale caught in Iceland arrived at Sealand in Victoria, Canada. They named him Tilikum. A former trainer there, Eric Walters, remembered Tilikum as, “Very well behaved, and he was always eager to please… Tilikum was the one you trusted.”

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2018/01/19/tilikum-killer-whales-tragic-life/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2018/01/19/tilikum-killer-whales-tragic-life/The Great East Coast Return To Abundance—Your Help Neededhttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/DXIzLpM3sS8/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/09/04/great-east-coast-return-abundance-help-needed/#respondTue, 05 Sep 2017 00:40:31 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5527One of the greatest recoveries on any coast is happening now. But it is threatened with reversal by one giant fishing corporation. Here’s what is happening and how you can help right now. Earlier this summer, some friends of ours told us they’d gone to the beach in Amagansett on the east end of Long […]

One of the greatest recoveries on any coast is happening now. But it is threatened with reversal by one giant fishing corporation. Here’s what is happening and how you can help right now.

Earlier this summer, some friends of ours told us they’d gone to the beach in Amagansett on the east end of Long Island, New York, and right beyond the surf was a humpback whale and a number of dolphins. Because I’ve lived there for 17 years, have been fishing there since the 1980s, and have never seen a whale from shore there—I can tell you that what our friends reported is definitely not typical.

On the other hand, I’ve never seen so many schools of the herring-family fish called menhaden as I’d been seeing. So to check out the report of the whale and dolphins, my wife, Patricia, and I went to the surf the next morning. It was a beautiful flat ocean, and sure enough it was dotted by many dark-purple streaks, each streak representing many thousands of the foot-long fish packed into tight schools. And yes, one sweep of the binoculars revealed some bottlenose dolphin fins glinting in the early light. No whale—yet.

We headed out in our boat a little later, and marveled as school upon school swam along in the near-shore ocean. And then, yes, we saw a humpback whale less than half a mile from the beach. I’d never seen a whale there before.

The next week I went fishing in an area that the local whale-watching boat used to refer to as “the dead sea” for its total lack of whales and dolphins. I’d certainly never seen a whale there, either. Well, this time I saw a blow, followed by a humpback whale’s flukes. It didn’t take long—thanks to one particular whale who hurled their bulk into the sky several times—to realize that, 1) there were at least four whales in the “dead sea”, 2) the “dead sea” was alive with menhaden schools.

But my most important realization was this: This isn’t the ocean I’ve known all my life. This is a new and improved, revitalized coast, returning to abundance, where everything has plenty to eat and big things linger all summer getting fat and staying relaxed. Whales are spending summers where no one remembers seeing them before; fish eating birds are doing better than anyone can remember, sharks are rebounding along the East Coast as nowhere else in the world, and high-value fish such as striped bass and bluefish have plenty to eat. Osprey pairs have been raising healthy broods of three chicks and many mornings this summer it took them a few minutes to find and catch a fish as the sky was getting light. Often they’d delivered breakfast to their chicks even before time the sun cleared the horizon.

Locally called bunkers by fishermen, menhaden are astonishing fish no matter what you call them. They eat by filtering the tiniest plankton from the sea. And by doing so they create the high-calorie, high-lipid flesh that is them—a miracle when you think about it. In effect, by being themselves they turn seawater into food. And so they are eagerly eaten by many fishes ranging from bluefish to bluefin tuna, by seabirds from terns and herons (who snap them up when they’re little) to gannets, gulls, cormorants, and loons; by sharks from blue to mako to thresher to white and others, and by every marine mammal from seals to whales. For that reason, on the East Coast menhaden have earned the moniker of “most important fish in the sea.”

But menhaden can be eaten only if they are there. And for many years they were not here. Commercial fishing had severely depleted them. Within sight of my house are the remnants of two menhaden processing factories who fished themselves into bankruptcy in the early 1900s, because when you take all you’re left with nothing. There’s also an island—Gardiner’s—where 300 pairs of ospreys used to nest, but they crashed too. Yet the fishing did not stop.

Menhaden are caught in higher volume than any fish on the East Coast. Basically no one eats them. They’re crushed into farm-animal food, their oil becomes the base of everything from paints to lipstick and gets put into omega-3 dietary supplement pills (of highly dubious efficacy because the omega-3 molecule might not hold up in pill form).

By nature, menhaden are supposed to be exceptionally abundant. But by the time I got to the east end of Long Island, they were largely a thing of the past here. I saw one small school of adults in the late 1980s. Then—nothing. They were so scarce that one day while I was in the wheelhouse of a boat that takes paying customers fishing and we came upon a big school, the captain—though he’s a professional fisherman—didn’t know what he was looking at!

Their disappearance began reversing in the last five years because of one thing: commercial netting of huge schools had driven menhaden to historic lows, and fisheries managers belatedly capped the catch for the first time. Almost immediately, about 2013, I started to see some sizable schools coming into waters around Montauk. And this year has been phenomenal, as the return to abundance continues.

But, you know there has to be a “but.” One corporation continues its grim reaping of millions of these fish for industrial purposes. For many years they fought tooth and nail to prevent anyone from putting any limits on their catches. And now not surprisingly the forces of greed are throwing all their lobbying shoulder into trying to claw back to high-volume, high-risk, depletion-guaranteed catch volumes.

The Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission is going to decide whether to drop the catch limits or modify them. An awful lot is at stake for our whole coastal ocean.

Please write to them to tell them you support “Option E in Section 2.6 of Amendment 3,” which would leave 75 percent of the population un-caught and require that the wild population never drops below 40 percent of its potential size if there was no fishing at all.

Please help ensure that there are enough Atlantic menhaden left alive in the sea to feed the seabirds, fishes, whales and dolphins.

Stop one corporation from again devastating the Atlantic menhaden’s population. Help keep Atlantic menhaden on track for their return to abundance.

You can submit public comment and/or testify at a hearing in your state in support of Option E in Section 2.6. Option E, the most scientifically sound option, will help ensure there are enough menhaden in the sea for the wildlife who rely on them.

Public comments on Draft Amendment 3 will be accepted until 5:00 p.m. on October 20, 2017.

Send your comments directly to where they will have the most impact and will become part of the public comment record.

Public hearings will be held in September and October in states all along the Atlantic Coast. More information on when and where hearings will be held can be found online at: www.asmfc.org/species/atlantic-menhaden/.

The final decision on Amendment 3 is scheduled for November 13 and 14 at the BWI Airport Marriott, 1743 West Nursery Road, Linthicum, MD.

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2017/09/04/great-east-coast-return-abundance-help-needed/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2017/09/04/great-east-coast-return-abundance-help-needed/Wild voices: Audio “notes” from Beyond Wordshttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/MZTnFureGwE/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/08/31/wild-voices-audio-notes-beyond-words/#respondThu, 31 Aug 2017 21:00:51 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5523During my field time in writing Beyond Words, I often dictated notes into a little digital recorder. While in the wild, there were a couple of opportunities to record sounds from some of the exact same individual wolves and killer whales (orcas) who I write about in the book. I find these callings extraordinarily haunting. […]

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2017/08/31/wild-voices-audio-notes-beyond-words/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2017/08/31/wild-voices-audio-notes-beyond-words/Carl Safina joins board of nonprofit working to improve lives of captive cetaceanshttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/akG_ttWZgIU/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/07/20/carl-safina-joins-board-nonprofit-working-improve-lives-captive-cetaceans/#respondThu, 20 Jul 2017 14:11:44 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5517By Erica Cirino There are many people who believe whales and dolphins do not belong in aquariums and marine parks, and for good reason: When you put a large, highly intelligent animal that naturally travels a hundred or more miles a day into a small concrete tank, the results aren’t pretty. The animals suffer increased […]

There are many people who believe whales and dolphins do not belong in aquariums and marine parks, and for good reason: When you put a large, highly intelligent animal that naturally travels a hundred or more miles a day into a small concrete tank, the results aren’t pretty. The animals suffer increased mental and physical disease and mortality, are more aggressive toward people and other animals, cannot perform many of their natural behaviors and experience broken family bonds. Instead, they are forced to perform “tricks” for human enjoyment.

The Whale Sanctuary Project, a nonprofit co-founded last year by neuroscientist and animal rights activist Dr. Lori Marino, has a goal of creating a safe, healthy environment for captive cetaceans to gain more freedom. This will come in the form of a large seaside sanctuary that would house these captive animals, as well as sick and injured wild whales and dolphins. A highly trained staff would oversee their care, and the group also plans to create an on-site and virtual education center.

Now, author and ecologist Dr. Carl Safina has announced he is accepting a position on the Whale Sanctuary Project’s Board of Directors. He says he is willing to contribute to the project in any capacity he can.

“This is about enlarging our circle of compassion to include lifetime care for captive or injured whales and dolphins,” Safina says.

Safina has studied animal behavior and has written extensively about both the physical and emotional lives of animals. Most recently he has published Beyond Words; What Animals Think and Feel, which profiles, among other creatures, killer whales—which are a type of cetacean commonly kept in captivity.

Tilikum, a killer whale performing at SeaWorld in Orlando, Florida, in 2015. He died this year. Photo: Christian Benseler (flickr)

Currently the Whale Sanctuary Project is focused on building the foundation it needs to build a sanctuary in the future. The first sanctuary would be the size of a large city park and could home six to eight cetaceans. There would be sea nets separating the sanctuary from the open ocean and could create separation within the sanctuary. It’s scouting for potential locations in British Columbia, Nova Scotia and Washington State. The organization plans to decide on a final location by the end of 2017.

It has assembled a board, which, besides Safina and Whale Sanctuary Project President Lori Marino, includes Executive Director Charles Vinick who has worked closely with Jacques and Jean-Michael Cousteau on various ocean conservation initiatives, David Phillips of Earth Island Institute and Naomi Rose of Animal Welfare Institute in Washington, D.C. It also has a full staff and team of advisors working on the project.

The project was funded with an initial grant of $200,000 from Munchkin, Inc., whose founder Steven Dunn was inspired to donate after learning about the lives of captive cetaceans in the documentary Blackfish. This year Munchkin has donated a $300,000 challenge grant, which Whale Sanctuary Project hopes to match by the end of the year. The total cost of the sanctuary is $15 to $20 million.

While the price of the sanctuary may be steep, the sanctuary’s benefit to cetaceans could be priceless. It would give them a refuge to more peacefully and naturally live out their lives. And it would also serve as a symbol of humanity’s changing beliefs about keeping animals in captivity.

“The presence of a sanctuary will serve to demonstrate how our relationship to these magnificent animals is changing, potentially enabling all captive whales to live in natural environments and—one day—ending the practice of theatrical performances,” Marino says.

Wild offshore bottlenose dolphins jumping on their own free will–not because they were forced to do so for the enjoyment of people. Great South Channel, July 2017. Photo: Carl Safina

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2017/07/20/carl-safina-joins-board-nonprofit-working-improve-lives-captive-cetaceans/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2017/07/20/carl-safina-joins-board-nonprofit-working-improve-lives-captive-cetaceans/5 questions with Carl Safinahttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/HOgevMGtZnc/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/13/5-questions-carl-safina/#respondFri, 13 Jan 2017 13:44:57 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5516Stony Brook University recently featured Carl Safina in a short film asking him “5 questions” about his college experience and the importance of mentorship this January, which is National Mentoring Month. Check out the video!

]]>Stony Brook University recently featured Carl Safina in a short film asking him “5 questions” about his college experience and the importance of mentorship this January, which is National Mentoring Month. Check out the video!

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/13/5-questions-carl-safina/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/13/5-questions-carl-safina/World body that could protect elephants—decides not tohttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/t70rHBe3bJ4/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/world-body-protect-elephants-decides-not/#respondTue, 03 Jan 2017 19:20:36 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5511Earlier this month the nations of the world met to decide on how to deal with the sale of wild animals and their parts. Yes, that is still the relationship we have with them. Highest on many minds was the most acute driving force behind the most talked-about, most widely cared-about conservation issue on Earth […]

]]>Earlier this month the nations of the world met to decide on how to deal with the sale of wild animals and their parts. Yes, that is still the relationship we have with them. Highest on many minds was the most acute driving force behind the most talked-about, most widely cared-about conservation issue on Earth at the moment: how to save elephants. How to stop the bloodshed and precipitous decline of Africa’s elephants due to killing for their tusks.

The nations decided to do almost nothing.

Ivory is about elephants. Elephants that are intelligent and sensitive and social and live with their families and need their mothers. But for many people and many governments, ivory is about “trade.” Sales. Commerce. Enforcement. Money.

International trading in ivory and other “wildlife products” is regulated through a treaty called the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES, pronounced SY-tees). The many nations that abide by this treaty meet every three years to consider new proposals and adjustments. They keep lists. If they put a species on the list called Appendix I, sale of that species across national borders is not allowed.

Twenty-nine African countries went into the recent meeting in Johannesberg wanting a total ban on ivory sale. But South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, and Botswana—with the largest remaining elephant population of any country—wanted to extend the possibility of selling ivory and killing elephants. During intense debate Botswana surprised everyone by joining the others in calling for an all-out ban. Even China came out strong. It was looking promising.

Then an amazing thing happened. The European Union, voting as one “member” of CITES but with each of its 28 countries still—nonsensically and disruptively—getting a separately counted vote, came out against the total ban. So, did the United States. And so, incredibly, did the World Wildlife Fund. WWF’s wants more enforcement toward ending the illegal ivory trade—as if a total ban would not help do that.

Instead of a ban, the CITES nations agreed to tinker around the edges. The procedure for deciding how to let South Africa, Namibia, and Zimbabwe sell ivory was suspended, leaving the countries that want to sell in limbo about how to proceed; they’ll be back. And all nations were advised to end internal sale of ivory. The recommendation is non-binding. Japan has already said it won’t comply. If you want to look at that glass as half-full, then drink deep. If you care about elephants, then you’ll want something stiffer.

Philo, dead. This photo was taken four days after previous photo, in the adjacent Buffalo Springs Reserve, Kenya, 2013. Photo: Carl Safina

Many conservation organizations who worked hard for elephants have put a positive spin on the outcome, since this is what they got and it’s a little better than nothing. For my part, I’m disgusted—with the dithering, the murky messaging, the politics, the weakness. If we cannot take a strong stand for elephants—the world’s most beloved and most recognizable creature—is there hope for a better deal between humanity and the living world? Indeed, is there simply even hope for elephants?

In understand there are problems. In understand that humanity’s decision to manage elephants and banish them to reserves and parks requires money. I understand that expanding farms often come in conflict with elephants and that local people may be more inclined to keep elephants around at all if they can kill some for cash. I understand that elephants will eventually die of old age and leave tusks worth money. I understand that a ban does not end criminal activity unless there’s enforcement.

I also understand this: whenever anyone is allowed to sell some ivory, there are people ready to kill elephants illegally wherever elephants live. By now everyone should know this in spades.

In the 1980s CITES enacted a legal ivory sales-quota system. It didn’t work. Elephant numbers continued plummeting because continuing to allow selling certain ivory facilitated easy laundering of any ivory. That was Lesson One.

The only thing that has ever worked was a bitterly won worldwide ivory ban, first implemented in 1990. Zero allowed. Ivory prices instantly collapsed. Elephant populations slowly increased. The ivory ban worked. Lesson Two.

But it lasted only until 1999. That year CITES allowed Zimbabwe, Botswana and Namibia to sell 50 metric tons of stockpiled ivory to Japan, calling it a “one-time-sale.” Then China wanted in. In 2008, CITES administrators let China buy stockpiled ivory from Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Zimbabwe—the second “one-time” sale.

Failure to learn from mistakes is unwise, but failure to learn from success takes true determination.

“Ivory is illegal; don’t buy it” is a clear message to consumers, law enforcers, and governments. “Some ivory is illegal, but some is OK,” creates confusion that offers perfect cover for killing elephants. Giving China some stockpiled ivory opened floodgates to laundering illegal tusks. Immediately, poaching surged, condemning tens of thousands of elephants to death while fueling human bloodshed. In Kenya, for instance, killing ballooned eightfold from fewer than 50 elephants killed in 2007 to nearly 400 in 2012. Aggressive enforcement has recently brought that number down. But we have very far to go to ensure a future for elephants. From an estimated ten million elephants in the early 1900s, there are fewer than half that now. And an estimated 30- to 40,000 elephants are being killed every year—an elephant every 15 minutes. Today Africa’s elephant population is about 100 fewer than yesterday’s.

All of this robs elephants of course, but people too. In Kenya alone, 300,000 people rely directly on tourism for employment and every tourist comes wanting to see elephants. Poaching for profit is a poverty-maker.

Acutely, an elephant’s problem is ivory. Chronically the problem is shrinking space. Rich or poor, humans seem too much of a good thing. One wonders where this trend of growing human numbers and appetites, afflicting elephants and humans alike, is headed. The smallest slices of any pie get cut at the most crowded tables. Can we afford to value elephants, and human beings, any less than we do? Can we afford not to value them more? I am very fond of civilization, but what’s the plan?

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/world-body-protect-elephants-decides-not/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/world-body-protect-elephants-decides-not/How Old is Today?http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/DRzIgjR00s8/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/how-old-is-today/#respondTue, 03 Jan 2017 19:15:52 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5504An Antarctic Morning The light comes from everywhere and from nowhere. The ocean, glittering then vanishing in gauzy vapors, handles us more gently than anyone could have hoped. Snow flurries in and hurries out. Mists veil coasts so raw, so newly released from the lock of ice, they seem barely to have brushed a breeze. […]

The light comes from everywhere and from nowhere. The ocean, glittering then vanishing in gauzy vapors, handles us more gently than anyone could have hoped. Snow flurries in and hurries out. Mists veil coasts so raw, so newly released from the lock of ice, they seem barely to have brushed a breeze. When the mists lift, sunlight strikes rock and ice and sea, radiating the bright brilliance of fleeting moments. Now we see that those rock slabs rising from shore spire up into jagged pinnacles crowning massive mountains stretching across the horizon and leaning back into eternity.

The shoulders of each peak lie draped in snowy capes. In the valleys the snows deepen and compress into fields of ice flowing — imperceptibly, but inexorably flowing — under an enormity of weight and time, frozen rivers of fate in confrontation with the sea. Unnamed glaciers between unnamed peaks, unnamed beaches no human foot has trod; and under an unashamed sky on every ledge the painted seabirds flit and sort and court and warm tomorrow’s youth. This is the original world, the world of eternal beginnings and endings, endless birthing and endless comings of age, all conspiring into the long procession of the ages.

“Stocks set records again as energy companies continued climbing with benchmark U.S. crude adding 15 cents and tech companies like Apple and IBM traded higher…”

The glaciers terminate as great gleaming brows of ice. Their heavy worry-lines of cracks and crevasses, the only evidence of their motion, foretell their crumbling fate. Within those cracks, broken hearts of ice 30,000 years old glow blue, glow turquoise — . Born in snowflakes before the last ice age, now old and wrinkled but still radiating youth from inside, they brood and hesitate over their inevitabilities. And isn’t it astonishing that even in time we can sense, in the moment of a human morning, they groan and roar and burst; sloughing great blocks of ancient identity into the heaving sea.

How old is today? There is no night, only light. So there are no days, only daylight. These shores who host our view, who cradle our glaciers, who separate land from waters as on the first day; they are today, too; they make today today, as they have been doing for one hundred million years.

As mountains go, they are young. Today is as old as cold coffee, acute as our deepest regret; vivid as the best day we’ll ever have. Today is new as the clouds that level the peaks for an hour, as old as the peaks that shave snows from those drifting clouds.

Today is as old as the words “should have.” As new as the realization that “should have” is an idea with no future. Today is as young as the word “enough” that frees us to attend to what matters, to meanings as deep as blue hearts of ice in the flicker of fleeting time and the brevity of our long and seemingly momentous lives.

“Hawaii: on the mid-Pacific atoll of Midway, the oldest known wild bird, an albatross known as Wisdom, has laid an egg at age 66.”

How young is today? Somewhere near the edge of our galaxy, on this sparkling dot of diamond-dust, for an instant our ship achieves the illusion of cruising slowly. The high peaks click past. The glacial faces smile anonymous smiles. Their broken bits crowd the sea like lost teeth.

“Washington, D.C.: Hydraulic fracturing to release natural gas and oil can harm the quality and availability of drinking water in the United States, according to a new governmental report.”

And beyond the toothy floating tiles of ice gather checker-board petrels, bathing, washing from their breasts the stains of parenthood. In the cliffs they trill and carry on their passions, forging this year’s link in the great chain of being. As do the penguins, braying on their hillsides, porpoising through their waters.

As, too, do the great whales on the wide and silver sea, spouting their great steamy fountains, breathing deep their recent reprieve from human savagery. Lucky for them that they hold few intergenerational memories. It frees them to comport with us as though forgiving all, as though this day is young, as though today and their children are all that matter to them.

“Rap Superstar Kanye West has emerged from the hospital to meet the president-elect, marking the artist’s first appearance since a reported mental breakdown.”

And so the whales and glaciers show us, but cannot teach us, that cherishing intergenerational pain is one way we curse ourselves, that it’s possible to remember too much to fully face the day.

“Beirut: the pullout of Syrian Rebels and civilians from their last holdout in the besieged city of Aleppo has been delayed.”

How old is today?

This ragged, rugged coast, crenelated and spired and frosted to white oblivion, having no eyes for night or light, sensing neither cold nor kiss of sun, has simply stood, has known only one day here for these most recent hundred million years.

Today is older than we are, and younger than we will ever again be. As old as we make it. We have today. And that is true every day, but won’t always be.

This continent of eternity and change, formerly so ravaged of life but now the best-protected of all worlds on Earth, offers us a chance, a glimpse of how to get it right.

]]>http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/how-old-is-today/feed/0http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/how-old-is-today/Birds “Common” in Name but Not in Nature Make an Appearancehttp://feedproxy.google.com/~r/CarlSafina/~3/V7x1eLcWMBs/
http://carlsafina.org/2017/01/03/birds-common-name-not-nature-make-appearance/#respondTue, 03 Jan 2017 19:01:14 +0000http://carlsafina.org/?p=5499In decades of birding, the best viewing two naturalists have ever seen of a very rare bird Photos by Carl Safina, text by John Turner Tipped off by a phone message from Carl Safina who was watching Common Nighthawks foraging over the Seatuket Mill Pond on Long Island, I headed down around 5:00 o’clock in the […]

]]>In decades of birding, the best viewing two naturalists have ever seen of a very rare bird

Photos by Carl Safina, text by John Turner

Common Nighthawk in flight. Credit: Carl Safina

Tipped off by a phone message from Carl Safina who was watching Common Nighthawks foraging over the Seatuket Mill Pond on Long Island, I headed down around 5:00 o’clock in the evening to see for myself. For the next 1 1/2 hours I watched anywhere from four to thirteen nighthawks feeding over the two ponds, with most concentrating over the Mill Pond. There was a huge hatch of small aerial insects and the nighthawks were feeding incessantly, along with tree swallow flocks of various sizes, ranging from groups of several swallows to a hundred or more.

What was nice about the event was that the birds were routinely skimming low over the water and since I was positioned on the stone bridge was able to look down on them and see their full coloration much better than the typical view of a nighthawk — a dark silhouette against the sky. One time a nighthawk came so close to the water surface it forced a gadwall to dive under the water.

Common Nighthawk in flight 2. Credit: Carl Safina

A little later one of the nighthawks flew toward me and proceeded to land on the bridge landing and resting on a stone top of a bridge abutment about 20 feet away. It stayed there for a minute before being frightened off by a couple walking over the bridge.

Common Nighthawk in flight 3. Credit: Carl Safina

As dusk descended the nighthawks left except for one that stayed with it. As I walked to the car a Great Horned Owl called several times from the wooded portion of the Frank Melville Preserve, a nice way to cap off a most enjoyable experience.

***

What’s so unusual about this sighting is that, while called “common” in their name, Common Nighthawk populations are in serious decline. Experts believe this is mostly due to a loss of habitat from land development and a loss of insect prey due to pesticide use. What’s more, these birds are elusive. So, it was a rare pleasure, to get such a great glimpse of these incredible birds, an experience we were extremely fortunate to have had.

Two female mallards, a cormorant and a turtle share a place to rest on the pond. Credit: Carl Safina